Over on the “California Fleeing” article posted by AWD, I took a few pings for not writing off California as a failed state just yet and pointing to California’s geographic location and its abundance of natural resources. Those pings ticked me off, so I guess I’ll have to give you Doom and Gloomers a reality check. Here goes.
California is the nation’s #2 producer of commercial seafood, after Louisiana.
California is the nation’s #3 producer of commercial timber, after Washington and Oregon.
California is the nation’s LEADING producer of commercial hard minerals, including silver, copper (yes, copper – not Montana or Arizona, but California), manganese, tungsten, and uranium. If you throw in the value of oil and natural gas production to the mineral mix, it still ranks #3 behind Texas and Louisiana.
California has the greatest variety of minerals to be found anywhere in the U.S., with 39 minerals of commercial value found ONLY in California. Think Rare Earth minerals for starters, because your laptops, iPads, and smart phones wouldn’t work without them.
California ranks #1 in the U.S. for tourist visits and tourism dollars. “Hey, SSS,” you might ask, “what does tourism have to do with location and natural resources?” “How about its climate, beaches, Yosemite National Park, the Sierra Nevada mountains, Lake Tahoe, Redwood forests, Sequoia National Forest, and Death Valley for starters,” I would answer. Places like Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, ski areas, sports tournaments, zoos, Hollywood movie set tours, and world class resorts don’t hurt, of course.
I saved the best for last. Do you like to eat? Well, do you, punk?
California is the #1 farming state in the U.S., by a country mile. It is the #5 supplier of food on the entire fucking planet. It produces 50% (!!!!) of U.S. grown fruits and vegetables, and get this, it is the #1 producer of dairy products – milk, cream, ice cream, and cheese – in the nation. Not Wisconsin, amigos, California.
As for so-called “specialty foods,” no other state comes close to California. The list is long: almonds, artichokes (mmm, tasty), avocados, figs, olives, pistachios, plums/prunes, pomegranites, raisins, and walnuts, just to name a few. All of this enormous agricultural activity is made possible by California’s unique location and its wide variety of climates and soils.
Here’s my bottom line. Even a long, recent string of extremely liberal governments in Sacramento has been unable to destroy this wealth of natural resources which sustains California even today. Not that the liberal left in that goofy state isn’t trying. And I certainly don’t dismiss some critical issues California faces, with water and energy production at the top of the list.
But, for the above reasons mentioned, I wouldn’t write off California just yet. Mother Nature has blessed that state many times over. Too bad the majority of voters there don’t appreciate it, or even realize it.
Actual photo of SSS, TBP’s lead investigative reporter who smugly dismisses his detractors.
Thanks for the details, i didntknow the specifics but knew california by itself had a high ranking economy even when measuring against other countries. If it werent for the scum flocking there it could be as close to a self sustaining paradise as likely possible.
Part of the reason it is so bad there and people refuse to leave is bc it has so much potential. Its ironic that it is so bad because it could be so great.
This captures the contradictions:
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/255320/two-californias-victor-davis-hanson
Thank you SSS:
A CA native happy in N. Calif. You are in good form Mr. Spooky.
So how is all this abundance and beauty enjoyed by the majority that live scratching out their daily existence because of the high cost of living there? All this is out of their reach. Not to mention the California Franchise Tax Board that continuously hound people because they cannot keep up with the high price of car registration, insurance, taxes and levies of all types resulting in high penalties and continual harassment along with cleaning out bank accounts with no warning.
There is a seething dark side of California government that people living outside of California don’t see. And the ones that see this dark side are the ones that cannot afford to live there.
There are old families in California that control the wealth of agriculture and old businesses.
If you are not rich or not an illegal alien then don’t come here is the unspoken motto.
All of the good things listed in the article are just the silver lining to the cloud! Sure California has a lot going for it, but their politics are screwing everyone and everything up; more restrictions, higher taxes, prohibitive gun laws, etc. Who needs it when there are much better places to make a living and raise a family in an affordable environment?
Argentina and the USSR both have/had enormous mineral wealth as well…we know how that is turning/turned out. Not to mention the fact that the seafood and produce has been bathed/is swimming in ever increasing radiation from Fukushima…but shhh we aint sposed to talk about that.
California (besides the mountains part) is mostly worthless desert without imported water. Perhaps when Lake Mead runs dry, they’ll dust off 1970’s era ideas such as diverting the Columbia River south (good luck with that!), or towing icebergs from Alaska.
There is a reason that the pioneers (prior to the gold rush), came to cool, wet Oregon instead of California.
I’m with Zarathustra.
CA produce is nada without diverting half the waterways of the West into CA deserts. It strikes me as about as stupid to produce milk products in CA as producing roses and orchids in Barrow, AK.
The moment the power goes out, all bets are off folks.
IIRC, CA is already a major importer of electricity. Given the Jerry Brown level idiocy regarding power, I think the future of CA is a return to the desert from which all but the north and coastline sprang.
Also, it would not shock me one bit to see northern CA try to secede from the lunatics in San Fran and south. OTOH, the entire NW is run by one variant or another of major Statists. The future is down for anywhere that leftists are especially in power.
Zarathustra says:
“There is a reason that the pioneers (prior to the gold rush), came to cool, wet Oregon instead of California.” because you’re the closest thing to geographical pussy?
there was a woman who said, if my kids are fat, so what? I am not begging money from anyone to feed them.
if the states were independent countries, california would be among the richest and a lot would be as poor as zimbabwe. but we have revenue sharing and social security taxes that prop up these poorer states. in addition, retirees take their money to oregon or arizona. residents take their paychecks or social security checks to las vegas.
California is not mostly desert, and it does not divert “half the waterways in the west.”. The coastline and northern half of the state get abundant rainfall, and the mountain ranges, especially the Sierra Nevada, normally get generous snow which builds and stays on the ground until late spring due to the high elevations.
The California Water Project consists of large reservoirs and canals engineered and built to divert water from the North to the heavily agricultural Central Valley. It takes unfathomable amounts of water to sustain crop farming on the scale it exists in CA. It is true that without massive irrigation, agriculture would not be a major industry in this state.
The Colorado River is another major resource for CA as well as five other states and Mexico. It’s water is used for agriculture and urban needs in some areas of Southern California. The Los Angeles Basin eventually becomes the edge of the Great Basin, the huge desert area that covers most of the West. Several areas east of L.A. get water from large underground aquifers (my community for one). There is a huge aquifer below Palm Springs and the Coachella Valley, allowing significant agricultural activity in what is otherwise total desert.
With the population pressures on California (yes, many may move out, but don’t forget our friends to the south who still want to move here) there is certain to be water rationing in our future I think.
Moving all this water around does use a huge amount of electricity. The state is vulnerable to complete apocalyptic disaster if we ever sustain a sizable loss to power generating capacity.
SSS, CA does indeed have many resources. Many are dependent on imported water, but regardless, they are resources. Economically speaking, though, resources don’t convert to economic prosperity in repressive political environment. CA’s high level of production is in spite of decades of downhill slide, not because of it (as you are well aware). In fact, CA’s production is a testimony to just how abundant those resources are-were they not so great (and so well-established from prior generations, in many cases), they would not remain so economically significant.
Point being, I will not argue the resources CA possesses, but I look at the trend, which is diminishing productivity, and to the social and regulatory philosophy that guarantee sliding down the slope. Get rid of most of the folks, repeal the free shit legislation, throw the criminals out (or deport them, as case may be), adopt a pro-business, pro-individual rights social and political agenda, boot out the EPA, and CA would be a great place to live. I might even consider moving back myself. Like I said in the previous post, this would require a benevolent totalitarian overthrow. Otherwise, those resources will continue to dry up, shut down or relocate.
Take away their water and what would they produce?
“Take away their water and what would they produce?”
—-Llpoh
Uh, that pretty much holds true for any place on the planet.
“Perhaps when Lake Mead runs dry”
—-Zara
That will happen when it stops snowing in the Colorado Rockies ….. for good.
The water problem wasn’t created by liberals per se, but by greedy city councils and developers who went into over development in order to rake in more tax dollars and profits respectively. They over built by a magnitude or so in areas that had no business having housing tracts. we lost a lot of valuable farmland to crappy tract homes that are only worth 1/2 of what they used to be.
Nevada screwed itself in a similar manner.
AZ did as well.
When protesters pointed out that these developments only made more vulnerable to droughts the fat cats only laughed or put a SLAPP lawsuit on the more troublesome protesters.
Now with Mexicans flooding into the state and many millions on the way, the water problems will only get worse and worse, for the Southern half of the state. Power problems will grow as well since San Onfre nuclear power plant is now shut down.
It’s quite worrisome, if you map it out on a x,y chart. You have population growth continuing upwards and power and water availability going down at the same time. Water rationing and rolling black outs will be in our future.
Business wise, the liberals have murdered this state. We have two dingbat feminazis who are totally impotent in bringing business or promoting a pro-business environment. At the state level, CAl OHSA. EPA are enemies of small business. Yet fail at inspecting crooked businesses that do engage in illegal dumping of toxic waste on a regular basis.
And yes, liberals do live up to their reputation of not giving a shit when businesses leave. Liberals really don’t care about such things at all. They didn’t care when aerospace left for other states or when heavy industry went away or when the tech sector up and left for Asia.
They don’t even care that the state is broke and the pension funds are a trillion in the hole.
But they do care about raising taxes on home owners and workers as much as possible to give to the parasite class – illegal aliens, 4th generation welfare momma’s, etc.
America’s Most Endangered Rivers of 2013:
(Click to view a geostory of the rivers, with photos and maps.)
#1: Colorado River (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming)
THREAT: Outdated water management
AT RISK: Water supplies, recreation, fish, and wildlife
The Colorado River is a lifeline in the desert, its water sustaining tens of millions of people in seven states, as well as endangered fish and wildlife. However, demand on the river’s water now exceeds its supply, leaving the river so over-tapped that it no longer flows to the sea (see more rivers that no longer reach the sea).
A century of water management policies and practices that have promoted wasteful water use have put the river at a critical crossroads. To address ongoing drought and increasing demand for water due to climate change, and to put the Colorado River on a path to recovery, the U.S. Congress must support robust funding of critical programs like WaterSmart that address water supply sustainability in the http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2013/04/17/americas-most-endangered-river-of-2013-the-colorado/Colorado River Basin and across the West.
“You will see a restoration of the Colorado River on the Mexican side of the border.”
—-former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, from the link posted by Sensetti
Jesus Christ, Sensetti, do you think I give a millishit about the Colorado River delta in Mexico? I do not. The river runs a scant few miles in Mexican territory, compared to 1,600 miles in U.S. territory, where it originates and gets fed by our tributaries. The fucking river is OURS, not Mexico’s.
I do not dispute the criticality of the Colorado River to the Southwest. But the LAST item on the discussion list is Mexico’s beef with our use of the river’s water. Fuck those assholes in Mexico City. You want Colorado River water? Well, help Arizona control illegal immigration to the U.S.
Sound fair? No? Then, see previous comment. Fuck you, Mexico.
SSS – I believe that Nth California is relatively water self-sufficient, but pump out a lot of ground-water.
Southern Cal – not so much. They rely pretty heavily on imported water.
Your premise is Califuckyas has an abundance of natural resources, which they do, except for they import lots of energy, and lots of water. ” its abundance of natural resources, ” you say. And you mention all the agricultural products they produce. But they are severely or substantially lacking in water, which they use to produce all those agricultural products (for instance, fruit trees suck up lots of water). So, n\my not to subtle point is that California is importing resources so as to be able to do all that producing you mention.
And I wonder how those Californfucks wil get on when there is an issue with oil supply.
Sorry about the typos. I thought I would get that in before SSS switched the attack onto my use of to instead of to, etc., in an effort to avoid the addressing the issue! He is sneaky that way.
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Wow what a thread!
Illustrates how we are interwoven and codependent on each other.
No water no food so California’s agriculture needs outside resource and the outside needs the food.
Where is the investment in infrastructure? You know…little things like the power grid could be getting up graded instead of blowing tax payer dollars on failed green energy companies.
I blame the federal goverment for 90% of the problem and the state for 10%.
Obamas campaign contributors had to get paid off via green energy front companies.
napari – the only power solution for Callitshithole would be nuclear, in my opinion. And putting nukes in heavily populated areas on a major fault line is always a great idea.
“Mother Nature has blessed that state many times over.”
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“California is the #1 farming state in the U.S., by a country mile. It is the #5 supplier of food on the entire fucking planet. It produces 50% (!!!!) of U.S. grown fruits and vegetables,”
I don’t want any produce from California!
SoCal is TOAST.
Much of the water they import comes from the Colorado River, and the power to move that water to SoCal comes from the Hoover Dam. The water level in Lake Mead has now fallen so far that it is not long before the turbines will fail. After that, the only way to substitute is to pull power off the rest of the grid, already stressed to the breaking point and highly dependent on Fossil Fuels. Using that poser will make what was Cheap Water prohibitively expensive.
Wake Up Call Coming.
RE
http://www.knpr.org/son/archive/detail2.cfm?SegmentID=10158&ProgramID=2805
Falling Lake Mead Water Levels ‘Incredible Warning Sign’
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AIR DATE: June 13, 2013
LISTEN TO M3U | DOWNLOAD MP3
GUESTS
Pat Mulroy, General Manager, Southern Nevada Water Authority
John Fleck, reporter, Albuquerque Journal
Robert Glennon, University of Arizona law professor and author of Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What to do About it
BY AMY KINGSLEY — The Colorado River — and Lake Mead — are in deep trouble.
Studies by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation show that demand will soon overwhelm supply. The first stage of water restrictions could come as soon as 2016, when Lake Mead has a one-in-three chance of slipping below the critical 1,075-foot threshold.
That’s when Nevada will have to cut its water allocation by 4 percent. Residents probably won’t notice the first round of cuts, said Pat Mulroy, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority. Still, it is an important limit for Colorado River users.
“It is an incredible warning sign,” Mulroy said. “Because what happens at 1,075 is that you’re now getting in to the lower reaches of Lake Mead. And Lake Mead is a V. So the further you go down in the reservoir, the faster the rate of decline.”
In recent years, the seven states that share the river — along with Mexico — have done a better job collaborating on ways to stretch the water supply. But it still hasn’t been enough to keep the level of Lake Mead from falling.
“We are buying and storing water in Lake Mead to buffet it and prop it back up again,” Mulroy said. “So if despite all those efforts, despite everyone spending as much money as we are, and everybody leaving their water in Lake Mead, we still get to 1,075 – the time has come for the states to really get serious about some real critical elevations.”
If the water falls to 1,050 or 1,025, then Arizona will be hit the hardest with cuts to the Central Arizona Project, said Robert Glennon, a law professor at the University of Arizona. But the conversation shouldn’t focus on which communities or industries will be hit the hardest, because they are all imperiled, he said.
“The bigger picture is that the whole basin is looking at a tough situation,” Glennon said.
The good news is that we can do something about it.
“We have the tools to use the water in a more sustainable way,” Glennon said.
The bigger questions is whether we have the time to implement those solutions.
“If this were to happen in the next five or six years, if you were to start seeing a rapid downward spiral, you don’t have the time to make the investments in an IID (Imperial Irrigation District), or a Palo Verde, or any of the agricultural areas down in the southern end of the system,” Mulroy said. “The time is not there.”
States have resorted to lawsuits, and even military action to protect water sources in the past. Lawsuits have a huge downside, and can cost municipalities access to water if they lose.
“What we’ve seen going back to the late 1990s is that it’s in their best interest not to fight,” said John Fleck, reporter for the Albuquerque Journal. “It’s much better for the water managers to understand how the shortage is going to be shared.”
Lake Mead will almost certainly fall below 1,075 feet in the near future, Mulroy said. Soon after that, life will change in Southern Nevada. Eventually, Hoover Dam will stop producing electricity, and water restrictions will change the way we live.
“Everything starts falling apart at elevation 1,000,” Mulroy said. “Which why, for our planning purposes, 1,075 is such an enormous trigger.”
“This is going to come as an enormous wake up call.”
According to a guy from CA. Most of the meth in the country comes from central CA. So they do have something besides food there. The whole radioactive seafood thing is a bummer. Between that and the whole southern gulf awash in oil and chemicals, I have lost my desire for sea food.
I-40 in AZ is like a friggin race track of CA. plated cars heading east towed behind uhauls. I see it every day.
SSS, you make good points that are difficult to argue.
Those in CA should stay there. Please. Texas, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico dont want you spoongaggers.
Ron says:
“According to a guy from CA. Most of the meth in the country comes from central CA.”
I totally trust the fact you post your sources.
“I-40 in AZ is like a friggin race track of CA. plated cars heading east towed behind uhauls.”
and that proves what? all that tells me is that if you want to go on vacation, you have to drive through that shithole arizona and on to the rest of the fucking shithole usa
FBS is a sensitive soul who loves Mexifornia.
Narcissism.
Stop it at the CA border.
“Those in CA should stay there. Please. Texas, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico dont want you spoongaggers.”-KB
TX, NV & AZ aren’t going to do a whole lot better than CA.
You know what happens when you Irrigate a Desert and run OUT of Water to Irrigate with?
This:
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Goes to THIS:
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GTFO of Dodge NOW! Go somewhere it actually still rains once in a while.
RE
llpoh says:
“FBS is a sensitive soul who loves Mexifornia.”
fuckers finally managed to piss me off, like we don’t have enough heartache with the lakers
“And I certainly don’t dismiss some critical issues California faces, with water and energy production at the top of the list.”
—-comment by SSS in the article posted
Some excellent comments in the thread concerning water and energy production issues in California, but those comments are narrowly focused on California. Water and energy are critical to the entire Southwest.
Water levels in Lake Mead and the Hoover Dam are important, yes, but they are also important upriver at Lake Powell and the power produced at the Glen Canyon Dam. Of greater importance is the EPA’s targeting the coal-fired, 2,200 megawatt Navajo power plant near Page, Arizona. The EPA has that plant in its sights and wants to shut it down despite hundreds of millions of dollars spent on cleaning up the plants emissions, which essentially affect a vast DESERT area to the east.
10% of the power at the Navajo plant is owned and used by ……. wait for it ….. the Water District of Southern California. Heh. I have not heard one peep by California officials on EPA’s targeting that plant. Not one.
More nuclear power in California? Sure, when Hell freezes over. The dumbass Californians helped to shut down the San Onofre nuke plant between San Diego and Los Angeles. But two more reactors can be built on site at the Palo Verde nuke plant west of Phoenix, adding about 2,300 megawatts to the grid and helping to help those who won’t help themselves (read Californians).
Water and power in the Southwest are complex issues. But they are not beyond our ability to solve them. In the meantime, I stand by my overall assessment. California is blessed with a cornucopia of natural resources, and it will at least another generation, perhaps two, of liberal activism to destroy it.
Damn, and here I thought we would get a full-blown SSS attack on those of us who (mildly) challenged his position.
Spook has done gone soft.
llpoh
How am I supposed to launch a full-blown attack on people who voiced reasonable, legitimate concerns about water and power issues in California, including you and, gasp, RE (his Lake Mead article)? You want an attack. Here.
“California is the #1 farming state in the U.S., by a country mile. It is the #5 supplier of food on the entire fucking planet. It produces 50% (!!!!) of U.S. grown fruits and vegetables.”
—-Tof quoting SSS in the thread above
“I don’t want any produce from California!”
—-Tof’s response to SSS’s statement
Good luck with sorting that out, dipshit. Don’t forget to take your iPad or Smartphone with you every time you go to the grocery store and your package of produce tells you “Product of the USA.” Google the producer. See if you can find out whether it’s based in California.
No satisfaction. Go to the store manager and demand he/she tell you EXACTLY where that fucking head of lettuce came from, if it’s even labeled in the first place.
Too hard to do, Tof? Then don’t make feckless statements on this site.
Satisfied, llpoh?
That’s better!
Maybe Tof should carry a geiger counter around so as to sort his vegetables.